Transition metal carbides are intriguing materials, some of which have been of industrial interest for a hundred years. It is surprising that the catalytic properties of these materials have been so relatively little investigated. These compounds possess attributes which suggest that they should be valuable catalysts. One would anticipate catalytic activity, since for example carbides behave as metals with the properties enhanced by the addition of carbon. They are electrical conductors and their high degree of chemical inertness should allow them to be used as catalysts under hostile conditions. They have unusually high thermal stabilities and one should be able to use them at very high temperatures without catalyst deactivation due to sintering. The relatively small amount of investigative work performed on the molybdenum carbide for use as catalysts has been performed on bulk materials. Activities have typically been low. It might be expected that if molybdenum carbide were to be supported on a high surface area support, much more interesting catalytic properties would be observed. However, the high temperature reduction conditions that are required to convert say molybdenum oxide to molybdenum carbide also adversely affect the surface area of the underlying support. Thus, a method that would provide for a supported molybdenum carbide catalyst which would retain high surface areas would be very useful in the catalytic arts.